Webster's Dictionary gives this definition to Candy Rain: little pieces of heaven
mysteriously falling from the skies.
So this story starts back in the mid 80's. I grew up attending summer camps in a little town in Arkansas whose name, Redfield surely came from the place crawling with red bugs or as we called them, CHIGGERS.
While other kids where enjoying horse back riding, zip lines, ropes courses and swimming pools at their camps, the highlight of Chigger camp was playing softball. Oh and if you were a girl you could either watch the guys play softball or do arts and crafts. We had to sit through 2 church services every day and regardless of if you wanted to or not everyone was required to be in the choir, which meant an hour long choir practice every day. The precedent was somewhere established that you must dress up in really fancy clothes for the evening church services but they would lock us out of our bunk house an hour before service and wouldn't open the doors to the "tabernacle" until just moments before it started. So it's the middle of July and of course it's like 150 degrees and we are all dressed up with our 3 piece suits and neck ties and the girls have frilly dresses, panty hose and enough White Rain hair spray to put 3 holes in the ozone. We would all pile up at the door like a bunch of fans at a Bieber concert and just sweat!
Ok so you get the picture that Chigger camp was in need of some excitement. Well one year some amazing person had a most brilliant idea. When we arrived at camp we were told that if we were really good campers that we would get a HUGE surprise on the last day! (apparently they had trouble with us being rowdy campers.....YOU THINK...we are bored out of our minds)
So the last day came and we were herded out to the back side of the "tabernacle" and each of us was given a plastic bag. They spread us out on the grass and from up on top of the "tabernacle" appear these guys with buckets full of candy!! We probably didn't even know what they had in the bucket but we were still all screaming like girls. Then they began to throw handfuls of candy into the air and every kid lost his mind! CANDY IS FALLING FROM THE SKY!
That was a huge success and if they did that every year it would probably make up for the other 4 days of boredom. But somebody must have said, "Gentlemen.......let's take it to the next level!" The very next year upon arriving at Chigger camp we were told that there was an even bigger surprise this year. So Friday comes and we are taken out to the field once again but instructed to spread out all over the field. (those of us that were there last year were trying to get the best spots around the "tabernacle") But they said "spread out all over the softball fields". We were a bit confused but still were trying to figure out what will make this an even bigger surprise.....better candy.....bigger candy........more candy?? Oh I forgot to mention that somebody had a bull horn. Someone always had a bull horn at Chigger camp but no one cared to explain to them that we couldn't understand what in the world they were saying.
So they guy on the bull horn says, "EEEERRRRYYYYYYY GOOOEETT THOTOOOOO" well that's what it sounded like, but i'm sure he said "every body get ready.....here comes the candy!!!" And in the distance we see this air plane! Are you freaking kidding me!!???!!! We really lost our minds. Imagine 300 kids with plastic bags running in circles as this plane approaches. As it flies over us hundreds of little white parachutes with bags of heavenly candy come floating out of the back of the plane and like little clouds of cotton they drifted to the ground, only to be attacked by 300 screaming kids. So as all of these parachutes are falling to earth the plane makes another pass and as it approaches the screaming intensifies once again. More parachutes, we are in heaven, we are the happiest kids on the planet. It was like mana from heaven. We were screaming things like, "this is the best day ever!", "this is amazing!", "thank you Jesus for parachute candy!", "I love Chigger camp!", "I love bull horns!".
So suddenly the amazing air plane that rains little white parachutes full of candy from it's backside, smashes into the trees and crashes into a cluster of RV's! It was like one of those slow motion shots from the movies, we went from screaming with joy "best day ever!" to screaming in horror.....just screaming! Everyone was crying, kids screaming "I want my mommy", the adults were now screaming and running around in circles. My friend comes running from the other end of the ball field crying and screaming, "MY PARENTS ARE IN ONE OF THOSE RV's!!"
In just moments our lives there at Chigger camp went from Heaven to Hell!
Well mostly good news, a few broken bones, a few busted RV's, a few broken trees, and one destroyed plane, but by God's grace no one was killed. There are however 300 children who grew up to be adults and are working through their trauma from that amazingly dreadful Candy Rain.
